RAM with stickers?

[mkaresh]

Does anyone else have a G400 with stickers on the RAM listing the type? Every photo I see of a G400 has the serial # of the RAM painted right on the RAM, not printed on a sticker stuck to the RAM. But mine have stickers.

I wonder because my RAM isn't performing like it's -5 suggests it should. The most I can get is about 183mhz. I tend to run it at 150/180 for this reason. The gclock is OK up to about 165, though, so it would be nice to get the RAM up higher. But it just doesn't seem to be happening.

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PIII 500e @667
Soyo SY6BA+IV
Iwill Slotket II
G400 32MB DH @144/180
Nokia 445Xi 21"
Aureal Vortex Superquad
128MB PC133
IBM DPTA 20.5GB 7200rpm
Toshiba 8/40 DVD

[Maggi]

Sorry no real answers, but a few questions ...

what's underneath those stickers ???

I've never seen that kind of ...

Was you card sold as a MAX ?

Even most of the 6ns RAMs hit 200MHz easily ...



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Cheers,
Maggi

Despite my nickname causing confusion, I am not female ...

[Thundrchez]

You ought to be able to peel off one of those stickers and see what is actually printed on the chip. I've seen the stickers used before, but not on the ram of a g400.

[mkaresh]

The stickers are white and cover the entire top surface of each RAM chip.

It's only supposed to be an OEM vanilla, but when I saw the stickers I figured I'd gotten lucky. I've peeled off a couple--there's nothing I can read underneath them. No fan header, so not a failed max.

The number on the stickers is the same other people have read off their 5ns RAM:
SEC...-5
But if this is really 5ns RAM, it should perform much better.

------------------
PIII 500e @667
Soyo SY6BA+IV
Iwill Slotket II
G400 32MB DH @144/180
Nokia 445Xi 21"
Aureal Vortex Superquad
128MB PC133
IBM DPTA 20.5GB 7200rpm
Toshiba 8/40 DVD

[mkaresh]

I looked at the card again. Here is some additional info:

Serial #: LAD285##
(any others beginning with LAD?)
Model #: G4+MDH4A32G

On PCB:
906-04 Rev. B
Rev. 402 MT00790

On RAM stickers:
SEC KOREA 940
KM413261120-5

[Wombat]

Hmm,
Another mysterious RevB.

[leporis]

A wild guess. You haven´t by any chance been fiddling around with ram timings on MGATweak.

I say this because very fast timings can be able to run at lower frequencies and crash at highers. So Mkaresh why don´t you post your settings?

[leporis]

You know, i say this because i own a card with 6ns ram and it can go as far as 225mhz

[Thundrchez]

Something smells very fishey here. Samsung is not going to slap stickers on their chips instead of printing ink on them. Stickers are too expensive. Occasionally other people will slap their sticker on top of the package to "hide" what the chip really is.

But having it totally blank underneath? That should not be the case. It makes me wonder if they really are Samsung memory chips.

[mkaresh]

I mostly haven't touched the SGRAM settings in MGATweak, just whichever ones are set by the drivers. I say mostly because I tried the settings in the PDF, and they had the same limits but slightly less performance, and I tried the conservative defaults in MGATweak and they gave me very slightly higher limits, maybe 187, but worse overall performance. So I haven't been messing with them. Whatever the drivers give me is what I've been using.

So, no one else out there with stickers on the RAM? That's what's got me thinking.

[This message has been edited by mkaresh (edited 21 January 2000).]

[Goc]

mkaresh... did you buy the board as an OEM product, or a nice box that says G400MAX?

if it was an OEM board could you post us what label was on the bag or just look on the card, the number should be there somewhere...

Also peel off one of those stickers and see what's underneath, you never know

If you indeed find what I am suspecting, and that is that your board is a plain ol' vanilla 32megs (one with the power connector on it) that was carefully "redesigned" to sell as a MAX, just go to the store where you bought it, find the dude that sold it to you, take the board in your right hand (left if you're a lefty) and bash his head into a red bleeding pulp with it
If after that your warranty isn't void, and there is still something left of the board, return it and demand that they give you a real MAX

Heh... got carried away a little

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Goc-that-likes-to-use-Matrox-boards-in-a-most-peculiar-manner